Many had hoped and prayed for it, though few had expected it. So when the sentence against former Serb general, Radislav Krstic, was announced in The Hague on Thursday everyone had a sense of history being made. This was the first time in more than half a century that an international tribunal was ruling that genocide had, indeed, taken place in the heart of Europe, the self-proclaimed standard-bearer of modern civilization. Before Krstic faced his judge, several other Serbian and Croat officers had been charged with genocide and appeared in front of The Hague tribunal. But none had been found guilty of genocide although all were, in the end, sentenced to long prison terms on charges of crimes against humanity.
Genocide is a special kind of crime, all in a class by itself. In a sense, it symbolizes the ultimate in the evil that men can do in the name of ethnic, religious, or racial doctrines.
Genocide was defined as a crime for the first time in a United Nations’ convention in 1948. At the time two Muslim countries, Iran and Egypt, played active roles in the process that led to its adoption.
Nevertheless, the authors of the convention were anxious to prevent the banalization of the term genocide. They came up with a complex and strict definition of genocide that is often hard to prove. For genocide to take place, there must first be intent. This cannot be an individual, sporadic and ultimately whimsical threat. The intent must be imputed to a clearly defined group or an easily identifiable authority and must be directed at destroying in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group or community.
Once intent is established, one must also show that action has been taken to translate it into fact. Genocide is not limited to mass killings as such. Genocide could be pursued in other forms. These include preventing certain groups from bearing children, taking their children away if they have them, and imposing demographic constraints designed to “ kill” the victim community through the decline in its numbers. Genocide could also be practiced in the form of imposing harsh living conditions on a targeted community so as to force its members to emigrate. These harsh living conditions could include the lack of jobs, denial of education and health opportunities, denial of access to certain positions in politics or business or the military, and preventing the normal development of the community’s culture.
In that sense, one can argue that genocide against the Muslim community of Bosnia, representing nearly half of the population, had begun long before Serbs launched their war against the legally established government in Sarajevo. From 1993 onward, many in the international community, including this newspaper that waged a massive campaign in support of Bosnia, warned that genocide was being planned and put into action. The United Nations and the European Union, however, continued to dismiss such charges and pursued policies that, in fact, encouraged the Serbs.
By the time the Srebrenica massacre had taken place in 1995, tens of thousands of Bosnian Muslims had been murdered and over 500,000 forced out of their homes. Bosnian Muslims fitted every aspect of the UN definition as genocide victims. And yet, most European powers rejected the term genocide even after Srebrenica.
The Hague decision must, therefore, be seen as a slap in the face of those European politicians who, motivated by petty partisan considerations, denied that a horrible crime had been committed in their continent.
The sentence passed on Krstic, though welcome, is certainly not enough. Now that genocide has been proven in the case of Srebrenica, it is important that the full circumstances of that crime be established so that others, directly or indirectly responsible for what happened, are identified.
To begin with, we must remember that Srebrenica was a UN “safe haven” at the time that 8,000 of its inhabitants, all boys aged above 10 and men, were massacred. Many Muslims had come to Srebrenica from surrounding villages solely because they believed the UN force, commanded by the French Gen. Morillon, would protect them. Had they not had such a belief, they could have joined the stream of other refugees who fled toward Sarajevo and thus escaped massacre. Just days before the massacre, Morillon had addressed a crowd in Srebrenica promising that he would defend the civilian population against any threat. But when the Serb killers, commanded by Krstic and Gen. Ratko Mladic, arrived, Morillon simply left the town and flew to France, never to return.
The United Nations’ Dutch troops, left behind to defend Srebrenica, simply withdrew to a corner of the city and watched television and played cards while Krstic’s men rounded up the Muslims and organized their massacre. The Dutch watched as Srebrenica’s women and children were herded together by the Serbs and forced out of the city at gunpoint. The European Union’s representative in the city boarded a taxi and left for Sarajevo after the massacre had taken place.
The UN flag was still flying over Srebrenica as its men were being shot and many of its women raped by the Serbs. Srebrenica represented the biggest massacre of Muslims in Europe since the fall of Grenada some 500 years earlier.
According to the Association of the Families of Srebrenica Victims, at least 600 Serb soldiers took part in the genocide while Krstic, Mladic and Radovan Karadzic, the Serb political chief at the time, were there to supervise the 12-hour long operation and to encourage the butchers. Karadzic and Mladic, living in Yugoslavia, are, of course, already indicted. But it is important that charges also be brought against the men who did the dirty job. Genocide cannot be explained away by the “I was just obeying orders” cliché. It is important for the future political health of the international community, and the multicultural and multifaith continent of Europe especially, that the whole truth be established about Srebrenica.
